Connected Creativity: Inholland and Riga students build together in VR
What happens when students from different countries meet in a virtual world to learn, create, and explore together? Students from Inholland University of Applied Sciences (Urban Leisure & Tourism Lab Amsterdam) and the Latvian Academy of Culture found out during ‘Creativity Connected’, an international education project where virtual reality (VR), creativity, and collaboration came together.
For two weeks, Dutch and Latvian students worked together on an international assignment in virtual reality. Not in a physical classroom, but in a shared digital environment designed as a virtual playground. Through avatars in platforms like VRChat, they explored what a creative space of the future, the year 2050, could look like. The assignment challenged them to think beyond borders and co-create new forms of creativity.
Collaborating across borders
The project took place within a COIL framework (Collaborative Online International Learning). Its goal was to enable international cooperation without the need for travel, while exploring how VR can support intercultural communication, artistic expression, and innovative education.
“VR not only made it possible to work together remotely”, says Farah, a Tourism Management student at Inholland. “It also gave me the freedom to experiment and express myself in a different way.”
The project was initiated by Kasia Głowicka, researcher at Inholland’s Authentic Leadership research group en developer of the creativity curriculum (Comenius Senior Fellow, 2023). For this project she developed a specific series of sessions in VR. She collaborated with her Inholland colleague Esther Bouw (lectorate Design Thinking), Ieva Zemīte (Latvian Academy of Culture), and Avinash Changa (WeMakeVR).
VR not only made it possible to work together remotely. It also gave me the freedom to experiment and express myself in a different way
Supported by a VIS innovation grant from the Dutch Ministry of Health, Welfare and Sport, the project bridged education and industry. Avinash brought in his expertise in immersive storytelling, which inspired students to explore VR as a sensory, poetic, and expressive medium.
Immersive creativity
The results were both creative and culturally rich. One team designed a virtual “gallery walk” where you begin with antic art collection and follow up to the modern Dutch dance club. Another team build a story-telling theater about the future of art classroom with hollograpic decore. One group even presented an immersive poem in which floating words, sound, and movement blended into a live VR performance.
But the most valuable outcome was the experience itself. Students learned to collaborate in an international context, developed both digital and social skills, and grew in self-confidence. “I was hesitant at first,” one participant shared, “but presenting as an avatar soon felt liberating.”
The sense of connection between students was strong. Many kept in touch after the project, and some collaborations even turned into friendships.
The future of learning
“Connected Creativity in VR” shows how technology, creativity, and international collaboration can reinforce one another. By literally stepping outside their own reality, students discovered new ways of thinking, working, and creating. A project that not only anticipates the education of tomorrow – but already offers a glimpse of it.
